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State Agencies Meet Resistance in Policing Fertilizer Industry 27 Aug 2013 | 02:28 am
In the third House committee hearing focusing on the West, Texas fertilizer plant explosion that killed 15, state agencies described resistance from some fertilizer companies in trying to inspect thei...
Poopgate Update: DPS Releases Documents 27 Aug 2013 | 12:22 am
Updated below at 4:50 pm: Today, the Texas Department of Public Safety released 144 pages of documents—emails and text messages primarily—related to the ongoing #Poopgate controversy. DPS initially r...
Anabel Hernandez on Mexico’s Lost Drug War and Her New Book Narcoland 26 Aug 2013 | 09:59 pm
Mexican investigative reporter Anabel Hernandez has spent years combing through government documents and cultivating sources in law enforcement, the military and the drug world. She’s come to the conc...
Dan Patrick and Thomas Ratliff Slug it Out Over CSCOPE 25 Aug 2013 | 07:59 pm
The year’s hottest education policy debate wasn’t about vouchers or school funding or teacher performance pay—it was about CSCOPE, the once-obscure curriculum program built for Texas schools that’s be...
Sorting Fact from Fiction in the Fracking Water Debate 24 Aug 2013 | 02:14 am
The West Texas town of Barnhart has become a hot spot not only for fracking activity but also the debate over how much of a threat the process poses for groundwater supplies. Barnhart is featured in a...
Researchers: “Triple Segregation” More Likely in Low-Scoring Texas Schools 22 Aug 2013 | 11:43 pm
Kids who speak little or no English represent a fast-growing share of Texas’ public school students, and the schools they attend are increasingly segregated. According to a study publicized last week...
Public Defender: Prison Reform Must Include Undocumented Immigrants 22 Aug 2013 | 10:56 pm
On August 12th, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced that “too many Americans go to too many prisons for far too long, and for no truly good law enforcement reason.” The speech has garnered lot...
In Salado, the Tea Party Contemplates the Nation’s Future — and Rep. John Carter’s Not in It 22 Aug 2013 | 01:38 am
John Carter’s no squish. The portly 72-year old congressman cuts a figure straight out of Republican central casting. The first Republican elected in Williamson County since Reconstruction, Carter’s b...
TDCJ Pork Story Undercooked 21 Aug 2013 | 09:08 pm
On Thursday, the blog Grits for Breakfast reported the Texas Department of Criminal Justice is paying about $750,000 to build six new climate-controlled swine barns. That doesn’t look great, since onl...
Jeffrey Kerr on Austin’s Tumultous Beginnings at BookPeople 21 Aug 2013 | 08:20 pm
It seems like just about everyone loves Austin these days, with noobie residents arriving by the thousands each year and national media crowning it (and crowning it, and crowning it again) among the h...
